


The Clip Show

by chucks_prophet



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels, Angel Castiel, Angel Hunters, Angels are Dicks, Angst, Castiel In Love, Fallen Angels, Heavy Angst, Humor, Hunter Dean, Hunters & Hunting, M/M, Minor Character Death, Minor Violence, References to Canon, Shameless Smut, Spoilers, Vigilantism, up to season 9
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 22:46:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7380403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucks_prophet/pseuds/chucks_prophet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The blood forming on Dean’s thumb trickles down the blade. He counts the seconds—the thunder, the footsteps, the slow increase of his heartbeat. Three, four, five… </p>
<p>But at the same time Dean lunges forward, a warm body shoves him back into the wall like a loose screw. Then there’s a hand over his mouth and a pool of chlorine-free cobalt eyes speaking to him. Dean’s own eyes mistakenly drop to the lips of the stranger’s—which are wide and pink and packed with enough lines running through to tell the time if he purses them a little tighter—and then he nods.</p>
<p>Of course, Dean’s dagger just has to fall out of his sock.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Clip Show

 

They're called the Clippers.

No, they're not a Great Clips union bonding over unfair wages and the rising price of aluminum foil, but the bond they do share derives from inequality.

Once upon a year ago, angels fell to Earth. No, not the doe-eyed doo-woping cherubs advertised on the stained glasses of your local church - the kind that'll reduce, reuse, and recycle your carcass like an Aquafina bottle, turn you upside down and shake you vigorously, making sure they savor every last drop.

Human souls, that's what fuels their existence - what makes them superior to humans. Or _made_ them superior. These days, angels can barely stub their toe without breaking down and crying.

They're weak. Limited. And now that they're human, they can be killed.

They call Dean the Righteous Man. Not because he's free of impurities, but because he's the only one of the Clippers to have had a first-hand encounter with an angel before initiation. It was at a séance with his brother and Pamela, a clairvoyant in her own right. Dean went to her post-waking up in a graveyard, sore and aching, with a bubbling red handprint large enough to cover the sphere of his bicep to show for.

Pamela commanded the angel, Castiel, to show themselves, and they showed alright. They showed themselves in a bright blue light that smothered Pamela like the face melting scene from Raiders of the Lost Arc, rendering her blind.

Ever since, he's worn a sigil over his right breast that banishes angels. It's not real, of course. The real thing involves some at-home resources, like human blood, but it's there as a reminder of what he fights for.

His brother was there that night, too, but Sammy couldn’t pledge his allegiance to a gang dedicated to angel annihilation. Dean’s takes full responsibility for that one. He’s the one who let an angel squat inside his vessel. The _one_ time he makes an exception for the smarmy bastards, the _one time_ he thinks he can trust a soul-leech to nurse comatose Sam back to health, and Gadreel goes and manipulates him.

(“You _know,_ Sam. God, we’re the two people on this whole friggin’ planet that know better than anyone, and you go and fall in love with one?! You _saw_ what they did me, what they did to Pamela, friggin’ melting her eyes like an ant under a magnifying glass—like she was _nothing._ ”

“Well, Gadreel hasn’t done that to me.”

“No… no, he has. He blinded you good.”)

Dean can’t do anything about his little brother. What he can do is clip as many evil sons of winged bitches as he can before his ticker chimes twelve.

With that thought, Dean retrieves a cigarette and lighter from the inside pocket of his letterman. It takes a few pumps for the curling ember to swamp his vision (the damn grease from that ‘65 soaped up his fingers) as he breathes in and lets his weary head fall against the alley wall before his sweet release.

It’s been a while since he’s done this. Breathing, he means, not the cigarette.

The heavy slap of a boot hitting a puddle jolts him from his short-lived euphoria. Dean throws his cigarette and whips around the corner, allowing only his head to poke out and see the figure coming towards him: a man, dark-skinned and heavyset, but tall with a hard, determined expression. A long, silver blade, glinting under the fluorescent moon, slides out from underneath his freshly ironed sleeve.

Dean’s fingers close around the knife inside his boot like the claw in a prize machine: slowly, then all at once. He doesn’t need an omen like the thunder that crashes around them, illuminating the outline of the man’s wings, which are held together by nothing but snapped tree branches and loosely strung feathers, to know what’s on his tail: Angels.

The blood forming on Dean’s thumb trickles down the blade. He counts the seconds—the thunder, the footsteps, the slow increase of his heartbeat. _Three, four, five…_

But at the same time Dean lunges forward, a warm body shoves him back into the wall like a loose screw. Then there’s a hand over his mouth and a pool of chlorine-free cobalt eyes speaking to him. Dean’s own eyes mistakenly drop to the lips of the stranger’s—which are wide and pink and packed with enough lines running through to tell the time if he purses them a little tighter—and then he nods.

Of course, Dean’s dagger just _has_ to fall out of his sock.

The angel’s footsteps clobber forward. Dean’s eyebrows rise with urgency, but Blue Eyes pinning him against the wall remains calm, only breathing when he needs to. Only as the angel rounds the corner, blade upraised over their heads like a shared halo, does the man lurch forward. Then the blade is behind the angel’s head in a chokehold and a silencer presses against his thumping temple.

“Go ahead, coward,” the angel spits. Dean swivels his head to Blue Eyes, who shows little to no hesitation as he pulls the trigger. The angel’s body falls with a sickly splash.

Breathless from more than just the thrill of the job, Dean takes a moment before saying, “Holy _shit.”_

“Hate to disappoint,” Blue Eyes retorts, stowing his gun, and _wow_ , that voice is rougher and sandier than Sandy when her boyfriend picks her up after seashell selling hours, “but there’s nothing holy about them.”

Dean laughs, “Yeah, no, believe me, I know.”

“Jimmy,” he offers, lending out a hand.

Dean slaps his own inside the palm of the stranger’s. “Dean. You know, I gotta say, I usually hate when people _literally_ cockblock me, but that was friggin’ awesome,” he breathes before gesturing to Jimmy’s gun. “Where did you get the lettuce for that thing?!”

“I’d tell you, but…”

“Alright, yeah, yeah, you’d have to kill me.”

“Oh, God, no,” Jimmy chuckles, “even if I _wanted_ to kill you double _o_ style, it’s bad enough disposing _one_ body. What on Earth would I do with two?”

Dean dares a few steps closer until Jimmy’s the one pressed against the brick wall. Jimmy eyes him up and down predatorily, like a lion stalking a butcher’s shop, tongue darting out half past six as Dean retorts: “I can think of a few things.”

*

Dean slams the door to Jimmy’s apartment and wastes no time with slow, slippery licks into his mouth like a pair of skates on a fresh sleet. Instead, he dives in head-first, breaking through the ice and into the warm, wet pothole inside. Jimmy responds with even warmer hands on the back of his neck, bunched into his hair, nearly tearing off the fair hairs on his nape in the process when he moves to cup Dean’s face with an equal amount of force. Luckily, Dean’s not built like a teacup; Dean’s a sippy cup: indestructible no matter which way you shake, rattle, or roll him.

Jimmy knows just how to do that, because when his other hand palms his denim-clad ass and slips between his crack, Dean does all that, allowing himself to be shoved onto the bed.

“J-Jimmy,” he breathes as he puts a hand over his unzipped jeans and rocks into his hard self, “I-I need—” Jimmy takes the words out of his mouth with his thieving tongue.

“I know,” he growls, hovering over him again as he slips beneath the cotton and takes him into his mouth.

Dean’s hand flies to Jimmy’s nest of hair as the other strums his hardening nipples underneath his flannel like a novice guitarist ghosting over each string until he finds high G.

He arches into Jimmy until he hits the roof of his mouth and pulls out before flipping their positions, leaving Dean’s member aching and cold to the air around them. Then, he’s shucking off everything below Jimmy’s waist, leaving him equally exposed. Dean leans over, putting just enough pressure on his lower extremities in the process to sigh softly, and whips out a condom from his jeans to roll onto Jimmy. Jimmy circles his hips and moans with every flick of Dean’s wrist; Dean could get off to the sight alone.

Dean’s too much in pain to pull his own underwear down completely, so he merely tucks his boxers just past the sweaty pleat where his ass meets his thighs, and slides onto Jimmy. And yeah, he’ll regret it later, but right now, he’s taking pride in the way Jimmy’s head flies into the pillow, leaving his Adam’s apple ripe and ready for the taking. Dean leans forward, catching his neck and sucking so hard Jimmy nearly forgets to thrust into Dean. Dean grinds onto him fumbling with his hardness through his underwear.

By a miracle, halfway through, Jimmy pulls himself forward and runs a hand under Dean’s shirt until aligning with the handprint the angel _Cas-teel_ gave him. And for some reason, that does it for Dean—and Jimmy. He rolls over, eyeing Jimmy from the side, hearts still racing in tandem as he asks, “Wanna cuddle?”

Jimmy shakes from laughter before replying, “I think I’m alright.”

“Yeah, I’m not much of a…” Dean’s eyes catch Jimmy’s lips again. “Romantic, anyway,” he finishes before leaning over and capturing them again, this time softer and with fewer motives behind it. Jimmy’s practically a puddle, lithe and unfazed by the heat they’ve cocooned themselves in, but he still breathes into it.

His eyes, unbeknownst to the kisser himself, don’t leave Dean as he does so.

***

“So this girl Hael comes up to me on the street, right?” Richie starts, smoothing his gold chain. “And she says, ‘ _You lookin’ for a good time?’_ and I say, ‘Usually, I don’t go for this kinda gig, but you’re sweet enough. You got protection?’ and she says, ‘I have condoms—unless you’re referring to that knife in your pocket.’ And I say, ‘I am. And ‘s _real_ happy to see you’ and I gank that mother right there, I mean _right there,_ broad daylight—”

“Richie, you’re stuffed tighter than a calzone.”

“Don’t you come at me with those stereotypes, Victor, I swear to God.”

Victor scoffs, “Oh boo hoo, I’m a white guy in America—I’m so _demeaned.”_

Dean tuned out halfway through Richie’s first story. Stories of the Clippers weren’t usually anything beyond a decent hand job. At least the pub they go to serves all night. It’s half price after the third beer.

“Hey, you okay, Chief?” Benny asks leaning in, the scent of fish and spice almost masking his musk. Benny works at Guildry’s Cajun Café with his niece Elizabeth. Dean’s a regular. Normally, he doesn’t go for Southern, at least not anything past a deep-fried burger with those tongue-teasing flaky onion rings, but the pecan pie is to die for, and watching Benny try and fail to charm his yin, Andrea, is quite the show.

Dean turns to him with a small smile and a nod. “Yeah, just thinking.”

“Uh oh, we’re all doomed.”

Dean laughs low enough so the other guys don’t hear, “No, just work stuff. Some guy brought in this ‘65 Camaro and it’s slipperier than a sixteen-year-old’s junk. My hands can barely hold onto a beer.”

“You seem’ta be chuggin’ it just fine,” Benny remarks.

“Long couple of days.”

“Well, at least you got’ta have a little fun.”

Benny raises his beer without another word, giving Dean’s eyes a five second head start at the great escape from their respective sockets. He keeps his voice to a whisper, raging: “How on Earth?!”

“Please, brotha, you _reek_ of it,” Benny retorts, eyes crinkling. “Who was the lucky bastard?”

Dean shakes his head, tipping his beer back as he comments, “How do you know it wasn’t a woman?”

“Dean, you haven’t slept with a woman since 2009. Now, who is he?” After a moment of unresponsiveness, Benny dips his head. “Please tell me you remember his name.”

Dean scoffs before relenting like the froth around the rim of his glass: “Jimmy, his name’s Jimmy—or was. It was a one-night thing.” Benny raises his eyebrows, one part impressed, two parts amused. “You’re a damn pervert, you know that? He’s a Clipper, like us. Saved my life, actually. Must be part of the newest initiation, because I haven’t seen around him until then.”

“Look, man, I’m happy for you, I really am,” Benny says, blue eyes shining just before a tidal wave crashes. Dean’s awaiting the inevitable ‘but’ that follows: “But I ain’t heard of a Jimmy.”

*

“Who are you?”

Jimmy—if that’s his _real name—_ narrows his eyes with a brusque laugh, “Nice to see you again, Dean.” He pauses, lingering on his doorstep and holding out his arms like a welcome mat. “What else am I missing? Oh yeah, I’ve been thinking about you since that night, too, and those fan fiction green eyes—”

“Cut the crap, man!” Dean barks, loud enough for a few people strolling down the sidewalk to gape. He props himself up with his right arm, creating a bridge over Jimmy’s head, and gestures to his boot in a rage whisper, “I can string you up out here on the lamp post, or on your clothes line in the patio. Your choice.”

There’s a long pause before Jimmy throws a smirk at Dean’s soiled boots. “Dean, if you suspected _anything,_ you’d know that _Play-Doh_ cutter’s not going to work on me.”

“Outside, huh?” Dean retorts, enclosing him even more. “I’d never take you for a Christmas ornament. Unless…” It’s Dean’s turn to grin wickedly as he spits in the man’s ear: “You’re a tree topper.”

Before Dean knows it, they’re in the same position as they were the night they met: Except this time, they’re inside Jimmy’s apartment. The guy _manhandled_ him, slammed the door, and threw him against the wall.

Jimmy’s breathing is even enough to be put under a lie detector test, but his heart rate is high enough to send the needle spiraling out of control. The familiar scent of aftershave overwhelms Dean’s senses, but it’s nothing compared to the gaze piercing through him like ice this time, rather than the sea.

“Listen,” Jimmy grits out, hand pressing against Dean’s mouth tighter than a couple nights ago, like he’s keeping a demon from coming out until he incites the exorcism, “can we stow the hard feelings until _after_ I explain myself?”

“Why?” Dean bites back, though it’s muffled against his skin. “So you can fuck me into forgetting?” Dean’s feet hit the ground. Baffled, but nonetheless maddened, he watches Jimmy scrub a hand down his face as he saunters to the other end of the room. Dean doesn’t hear what he mumbles. “Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

“It’s Cas,” Jimmy repeats, this time louder. He turns around to meet Dean’s eyes. “My name’s Castiel, alright?”

Dean doesn’t have to rake his hat too much to draw the name out: “Castiel. Like, _the—”_

“Gripped-you-tight-and-raised-you-from-Perdition Castiel?” he finishes before nodding. “Yes, _that_ Castiel.” Dean’s eyes widen to the size of Granny Smiths. “Jimmy is a devout man. He actually prayed for this, for me to use his vessel. And I’m sorry about the mark. I tried to leave you unscathed when I pieced you back together, but that’s the price of an angel plucking a human soul from Hell—”

“Wait,” Dean says, voice cracking. It’s crazy, but he can actually _feel_ the handprint glowing, burning with the memories of-of—“ _Hell?”_

Castiel looks a cross between disappointed and relieved. “You mean you don’t… remember?”

“No, no, I woke up in a graveyard. I crawled my way out of a godforsaken grave, feeling like-like—”

“You were in a blender, set to puree?”

“No, no. You can’t-you can’t know that—” Dean stops, slave to his body, which is shaking all over. Castiel stays where he’s at, not itching to touch him like a couple nights ago. Dean would push him away anyway.

“Dean,” Castiel says softly, “there’s a reason you’re the Righteous Man: You traded your soul for your brother’s. In exchange, you got another year with him. Halfway through, he developed cancer. The angels had already fallen, the world was imbalanced—no thanks to _me,_ by the way—and you took it upon yourself to see that he lived before you left. Dean, _you_ trusted us. _You_ gave us hope that the humans still needed us—”

“You lied to me,” Dean growls, tears pricking his eyes, “to _sleep_ with me, too, some guardian angel you are—”

“I had to gain your trust. And it wasn’t—”

“What happened to gaining my trust all those years ago?! Where were you?! You just left!”

“I hunted, I rebelled, and I did it, all of it, for _you,_ Dean!”

Dean blinks a few times, feeling the weight of all the unshed tears heavy on his chest as he breathes, “What?” Castiel shifts his gaze to the floor and dares a few steps closer.

“You weren’t meant to be pulled out of Hell, Dean,” Castiel replies, voice quiet. “At least not by me. I…”

“What?” Dean repeats, pulse beating a brash rhythm against his skull.

“I disobeyed my Father’s orders,” Castiel sighs. “I was only supposed to oversee the operation—all of us were. Your resurrection was equivalent to the moon landing in Heaven. No one was supposed to intervene. My father—God _himself—_ had organized the whole thing. But I… I saw you down there, and I… I don’t know. I started developing feelings, which are the most dangerous temptations for an angel, and I knew… I knew.”

Dean’s mouth hangs in the balance of gravity as he sighs, “Cas…”

“Jesus, don’t—” Cas’s face twists. He holds up his hand as if shielding himself. “Don’t say my name. Not unless you mean it. It’s too painful.”

“ _Cas,”_ Dean repeats. Cas turns to him with wide eyes as Dean draws him closer And yeah, he’s about to trade in everything he’s ever believed in over one _devilish_ -looking angel, but his mouth’s already on Cas’s, and then Cas is kissing back, and he’ll indulge himself when he says Cas feels like Heaven.

The angel sinks into his chest, mumbling, “’m sorry I fucked you up.”

“It’s okay,” Dean replies, laughing a little. “I’ve always been a little fucked up anyway. Thanks for fucking up the universe.”

Cas laughs too, “I’m glad I could provide you with, what do you call us, _winged-dick punching bag therapy_?”

“You really have been watching over me.”

“You’re quite an interesting specimen.”

A pause. “Cas?”

“Yeah?”

“Why did you cast the other angels out of Heaven?” Dean asks, knowing better not to pull away in doing so. He feels Cas blink against his flannel, using it as a napkin to smother the tears coming forth.

“I just wanted to help,” Cas says, sniffling as he finally draws back. “I thought if they saw humans for who they are—see you as _I_ do—they might ease a little on the whole dominance thing. But all it did was anger them.”

“And you’ve been hiding since,” Dean breathes.

Cas nods meekly before continuing, “There is one thing in my very long, very painful lifetime I don’t regret,” he says, resting his palm over the handprint again. “You know, there used to be a time when all I had to do to ease your pain was just… touch you. But I see now, the pain from falling, falling _hard,_ is worth it.”

***

Dean knocks on the door with bated breath. The wind carries the faintest perfume of weed—not the flammable kind, unfortunately—mixed with the wind’s drunken movements. It’s as vacillating as his courage.

Two more knocks on the door. On the brink of the second, the door cracks open. Behind it is the man he shares a face with. The brown hair osculating his shoulders, hazel eyes, and the tall, pilsner frame comes from their mom. “Dean? What the hell are you doing here?”

The hardheadedness he gets from their father.

“Hiya, Sammy.”

Before either brother can speak, a taller man slips through the frame. “Hon, is everything alright?”

“Everything’s fine, babe,” Sam says, covering his arms, as if silently begging a soldier to hold fire. The guy definitely looks like one with his leather jacket over a green hoodie and bulging arms slowly snake to his chest, twisting into a tight pretzel. Dean hasn’t seen him so calm. “Go back inside; I’ll talk with him—”

“Uh, actually, I came to give something to Gadreel,” he replies, holding out his hand to the man.

Gadreel looks to his husband for an answer, then down, almost like he’s inspecting Dean’s hand for a grenade. His face doesn’t soften when he realizes there’s nothing there; however, he accepts the gesture. Dean shakes first, smiling up at him as he says:

“Welcome to the family.”

 

 


End file.
